


Only the Good Die Young

by kamalakhan



Category: Batman (Comics), Marvel (Comics)
Genre: F/M, I'm bad at this, M/M, a lot of this is still up in the air, i'm not sure which of them exactly though, probably some other relationships but i don't know yet, the avengers and the justice league will appear
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-09
Updated: 2015-02-18
Packaged: 2018-02-28 19:59:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2745173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kamalakhan/pseuds/kamalakhan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dick Grayson dies aged fifteen in an accident. Lost without his partner Robin, Batman becomes more and more convinced that there was foul play involved, despite all the attempts of the Justice League to make him accept the truth-<br/>Until one day, the Justice League is transported to another universe, where they encounter the undercover agency SHIELD.<br/>And, more importantly, Special Agent Nightwing of SHIELD.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

They were all going to die, sooner or later. This was obvious, not only as it is common human practice to do so, but also due to the rather high-risk lifestyle that they led. But this, he hadn’t expected.

Not _this_.

Bruce had always known that the people around him would die. He spent his nights literally trying to find people who were trying to kill him, accompanied by a fifteen year old with an elderly butler acting as back up. Logically, he knew it wouldn’t be long until one of the villains succeeded, until one of the people he cared about- one of his bizarre family that had somehow, against all odds, come to be- faced a trial too great. And Bruce was nothing if not a logical person. He had known this would happen.

But not like _this_.

The hand clutching the phone felt numb. His entire body felt numb. He could still hear the tinny voice of the speaker, even though the phone wasn’t at his ear.

_“I’m sorry for your loss, Mr. Wayne -“_

Bruce hung up. He threw the phone across the room; it landed in a corner, smashed into pieces.

It was an accident, they told him. The terrible weather conditions had made it nearly impossible to see, the truck driver hadn’t seen Richard Grayson on his bike until it was too late.

Richard Grayson.

Not Robin.

Richard Grayson.

 Alfred had clearly heard the news, judging by the look he was giving him; both sympathetic and worried and unbelievably sad.

Bruce wasn’t even sure when he had starting leaning against the wall,wasn't sure when he had punched it but there was blood on the wall and his knuckles were bleeding-

Suddenly he was angry. He was _furious_. How could this have happened? How could he have _let_ this happen? This boy, his boy, the boy who had such a terrible life that becoming a vigilante seemed like a good idea- the boy who had remained so happy and cheerful, despite all that the world threw at him.

How could Bruce have lost him as well?


	2. Chapter 2

Bruce Wayne was angry.

That in itself was not special, especially nowadays. Batman’s temper, short on the best of days, had been at constant breaking point in the last months and all the Justice League knew why, courtesy of a conversation with the Flash that had ended rather badly,the speedster asking on behalf of his nephew Kid Flash as to why he hadn’t heard anything from his friend Robin.Moving purposefully towards the meeting room in the Watchtower, Bruce ignored the sympathetic gazes and whispers that stopped directly before he was in earshot. He didn’t have time for this. He knew exactly why he was being called to this “impromptu meeting” Clark had called.   
Contrary to popular belief, his abilities as a detective had not been impaired by Dick’s- by the recent events.

* * *

 

“What do you want, Superman.” Never one to mince words, Bruce growled as soon as he stormed into the room. Superman, Wonder Woman, the Flash and Green Lantern were all seated around the conference table, having clearly been in deep discussion about something. Judging by Hal and Barry’s guilty faces, the topic of discussion had been him. Clark pushed himself out of his seat unceremoniously.

“Bruce. We need to talk.”

Feeling almost childish, Bruce couldn’t resist replying, “We are doing.”

Barry snorted.

“Nice one Bruce, how old are you, five?”

A glare from both the man of steel and the dark knight stopped his giggling.

“We just want to help, Bruce. We understand you’re going through a hard time-“ Diana begun, but was swiftly cut off by Hal.

“Just want to say, before you kill us all with your super creepy infallible plans to take us down if we turn rogue- All of this? None of my idea. Barry roped me into this. Feel free to kill Barry and leave me alive!”

“Hey! You backstabbing little-“

“Enough.” Interrupting Hal and Barry’s squabbling, Bruce’s voice was sheer ice.

“I am aware of what you are trying to accomplish, and I am fully capable of functioning as before, despite the- complication.”

“Bruce, we’re just trying to help-“ Clark’s plea was swiftly countered by the predictable answer Bruce gave.

“I don’t need help, Superman. I’m fine on my own. I need to go, I’m wasting enough time before patrol here already.”

Having clearly heard enough, Diana stood up. The look in her eyes would have made lesser men quiver in fear.

“No, Batman, it is time for you to _listen_ to us for once. This is not a simple hitch in a plan you made, this is the death of your partner, the death of the child close enough to you to be considered your _son_. How _dare_ you refer to him as a _complication_? You always attempt to remain aloof, but now is the time to listen to us, to let us be here for you! You are our friend, and as such it is our duty to help you!”

The white lenses in the Batman cowl made it impossible to tell what he was thinking.

“I don’t need your help, Diana.”

And with that, Batman left the room.

* * *

Arriving back at the Cave in the Batmobile, Bruce jumped out and moved quickly to the monitors. He had wasted valuable time dealing with the Justice League, he needed to examine the footage more closely. After weeks of searching, Batman had been able to locate CCTV footage of the accident- although, the longer he analysed the recording, the more certain he was that it had not, in fact, been an accident. Despite the horrendous quality of the source, there were clear signs of foul play. Dick had not been driving at a speed high enough to kill him, and the truck driver had clearly had more than enough time to spot him. Also, directly before the impact, a bizarre flash of light is clearly visible on the tape. Not enough to start a proper investigation, by any means, but it was enough to make him suspicious. Sitting over the desk while watching the short clip on a loop, Bruce didn’t realize how much he was slouching until a sigh to his left alerted him to his butler’s presence.

“I wish you wouldn’t do this to yourself, sir.”

Ignoring the comment, Bruce instantly straightened his posture and grabbed the cup of coffee on the tray held by Alfred, eyes not leaving the screens.

“He wouldn’t want you to do this. Master Richard-”

“Don’t, Alfred. Please.” Bowing his head solemnly, Alfred left Bruce pouring over the footage once more. The light of the monitors gave Bruce’s face a grey pallor, making him look deathly pale. Not for the first time, Alfred wished Richard Grayson were here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i've managed to basically plan out the majority of the story, and there is going to be quite a lot of dick/jason but i also promise to put in some cute moments between damian and dick  
> also a fair bit of clint and dick being bros, don't worry ;)  
> next chapter will be from dick's pov, i'll do my best to get it up soon!


	3. Chapter 3

The first thing he realised upon gaining consciousness was that he was lying face-down in the middle of an abandoned street. The second thing was that there was a guy standing right in front of him holding a goddamn bow and arrow in his face. The guy was clearly shifty- other than the fact that he was threatening him with a _bow and arrow_ ; he was wearing some kind of bizarre leather outfit and dark glasses. Seriously, who would wear that kind of thing if they _weren’t_ evil? Yeah, exactly.

“Ummm... Any chance you could stop pointing that in my face? I mean, not that I don’t enjoy being threatened by a weirdo in a leather suit, but, y’know-“

“What caused the energy spike just now?”

Ok, leather dude wasn’t apparently much of a talker. He sat up, slowly. It was time to get snarky.

“Energy spike? How would I know about a freaking energy spike? I was unconscious, or did you think the whole me-lying-face-down-on-the-floor thing was because I felt like a change of scenery? I can’t even remember-”

_Shit_.

He couldn’t remember who he was.

He was probably going to freak out about that later, when there wasn’t a leather-wearing killjoy pointing a dangerous weapon in his face.

This situation definitely wasn’t worrying him anywhere near as much as it should have been.

The leather dude rolled his eyes, pressed his fingers to his ear, clearly activating a comm device of some kind.

“I’m at the site now; all I’ve got is some smart-assed kid who was slap bang in the middle of it and refuses to give me a straight answer. He’s actually quite funny, it’s a shame he’s so shady.”

_Rude_.

Obviously paying attention to his orders, leather dude didn’t see the guy sneaking up behind him dressed in black until it was almost too late.

“Look out!”

Leather dude was lucky that he, apparently, was not only 'smart-assed kid who was slap bang in the middle of it' (whatever _it_ was) but also Jason Bourne Jr., judging by how fast he whooped the sneaky guy in black’s ass. Either that or he spent waaaay too much time at the gym. Which would be kinda sad, considering he was only, like, thirteen or something,going by his body structure.

Judging by leather dude’s face, he was just as surprised as him.

“How the shit did you do that, kid?”

He shrugged.

“Your guess is as good as mine, buddy. I kind of... don’t really know who I am?”

Leather dude groaned and swiped a hand over his face in an irritated gesture.

“Why does this kind of shit always happen to me I swear to _God_ \- Awww, _shit_!”

Groaning, he turned over the guy on the floor to reveal a small red insignia of what seemed to be an octopus sewn to his costume. Activating his comm unit again, leather dude yelled, in somewhat of a panic,

“We’ve been ambushed. Hydra. I don’t know how many there are, so yeah, back-up would be great any time now!”

Instinctively crouching into a defensive pose, the self designated Jason Bourne Jr. stood back-to-back with the leather dude, only now realising the amount of black-clad soldiers surrounding them.

“I got your back if you got mine, kid!”

“You’re on!”

And with that, they launched themselves into the horde of Hydra agents.

* * *

“So, Clint, remind me again how your  _simple_ recon mission of investigating a freak energy spike in downtown New York led to you fighting off a huge horde of Hydra agents assisted by a teenage civilian?”

Natasha’s overly sweet tone of voice made Clint roll his eyes.

“Yeah, yeah, hilarious. Trouble just follows me around everywhere; I don’t know what to tell you. Must be a part of my animal magnetism.”

“Other than the stench and fact that only primates would be inclined to approach you romantically, you mean?”

“Ouch. What did I ever do to you?” Clint clutched his heart in an overly theatrical gesture.

“You threw one of the Hydra agents at me about an hour ago!”

“I expected you to catch them!”

“I did-!”

“Far be it from me to interrupt your charming banter, but need I remind you that your mission is not yet over, Agent Barton?”

Nick Fury’s dulcet tones emitted from the loudspeakers in the corridor outside the interrogation room, where Agents Barton and Romanoff where standing. Inside the interrogation room, the kid from the street sat, fiddling with the standard issue clothes someone had given him. Clint groaned.

“Seriously? I have to interview him? Can’t someone else do it? I just fought loads of Hydra agents! Make Coulson do it! He never does anything anyway-“

“Barton, if you don’t get your ass to Hill’s office right now, I’ll make sure fighting Hydra agents was the funnest and most relaxing thing you did all week.”

Grumbling, Clint admitted defeat. Ignoring Nat, who was humming a funeral march as he slouched dejectedly and moved toward the door.

* * *

Cutting straight to the chase, Maria Hill brought a data file up on the holoscreen in front of her desk.

“We haven’t been able to identify the kid.”

“No ‘Hello’, or ‘How has your day been so far’? You wound me, Maria.”

Hill’s glare could rival Fury’s (and did, on occasion). Clint shut up.

“We feel like you would be the best person to talk to him, as you two seemed to hit it off before.”

“What can I say? Nothing like a bunch of evil soldiers to bring folk together!”

Ignoring him, Maria continued.

“We’ve run facial recognition software, audio recognition, everything we’ve got. This kid has never existed before today. Absolutely no records of him anywhere.”

“Is that even possible?”

Maria tapped the lid of the pen she was holding against her lips thoughtfully.

“See, here’s the summary of what we know about this kid: He suddenly appeared, passed out in the middle of the exact spot where a freak energy surge occurred a few minutes before you arrived. He has never been sighted before. Anywhere. And he doesn’t know who he is.”

Clint raised an eyebrow.

“So, we’re going with his memory loss thing? A bit of a lucky coincidence, isn’t it?”

“Way ahead of you. We got a few of our best in, and a lie detector. He’s not lying.”

“So how exactly am I supposed to interrogate the kid if we already know all the stuff we want?”

Maria smiled at him. Clint gulped. He hated it when she smiled at him like that.

“Your job isn’t interrogating him, Agent Barton. Your job is to offer him a position as a SHIELD trainee.”

Clint dropped the coffee he hadn’t even known he was holding. Aw, man. What a terrible waste of good coffee. He liked the office coffee here.

“Seriously? I find this creepy kid that can’t keep his mouth shut, has never existed before today and has no idea who he is or how he can _fight like a goddamn ninja_ and you decide 'yeah, that’s the guy we want as our next operative'?”

Hill arched a perfectly shaped eyebrow.

“Don’t act like you haven’t reached the same conclusion we have. This kid is from another world, another universe maybe. We need to keep him under observation, and this is a prime way to do it without him becoming suspicious. Also, he is clearly a good fighter.”

Clint sighed. He hated it when people talked sense to him.

“All right, I’ll ask him. I won’t be mentoring him though, will I? His techniques are very... different to mine.”

“Indeed. Fury and I feel that his style would be more compatible with Natasha’s skill set.”

Clint gasped in delight.

“Ohhh _yes_! I love it when Nat gets stuck with the rookies. The last one lasted a month, I think?”

“3 weeks, actually. Agent Romanoff can be quite hard to please where it comes to training, I believe.”

Maria’s eyes sparkled in amusement.

“Try not to tell the kid all of this, though. Oh, this is important as well,” she said, fishing a thin folder out of her desk file, “it’s a summary of his new identity. If he chooses to accept, of course. Otherwise, it’ll be a whole lot nastier.”

Flicking the folder open, Clint wrinkled his nose in disgust.

“John Volante? Seriously?”

Maria shrugged.

“Not my idea. Now you need to go give that kid a job offer he can’t refuse!”

“I thought you said he could refuse it though?”

“Just get out of my office before I get a migraine, Clint.”

Clint stuck his tongue out.

“Killjoy!”

And then he proceeded to run out of the room as fast as possible, more than a little worried about Maria Hill’s potential wrath.

* * *

Strolling into the interrogation room leisurely, he grinned theatrically at the kid sitting at the desk. The kid looked worried.

“Alright, kiddo. Here’s what’s goin’ down: as it stands, you are one of the weirdest cases I’ve had in a while. You don’t know who you are, we don’t know who you are- Nobody knows what’s going on, least of all me, but I have been sent in here to offer you- drumroll please- the job offer of a lifetime!”

The kid looked decidedly unimpressed. Tough crowd.

“You have two options. You come work for us, or you don’t. And trust me; option number two gets nasty real fast. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt.”

The kid frowned at him.

“So, I basically don’t have a choice but you’re going to pretend I do anyway.”

“Pretty much, yep. If you decide to help us out, we’re giving you a place to stay, financial security, and training to make you into a kickass secret operative, so it’s a pretty sweet deal.”

“Hang on. I’d have training? Like, with you? Because no offence, but our fighting styles are totally different. Also, bow and arrow? Isn’t that really impractical?”

“Hey! No insulting the weapons, kid! Your training’ll be with Natasha, actually. She helped out back with the Hydra agents, if you remember? Her skills suit yours better.”

“You’re grinning. Why are you grinning, what aren’t you telling me-“

“It’ll be great, don’t worry! Oh, while I remember, he’s your new identity, kid. Can’t keep calling ya ‘kid’, it’d get confusing!”

“You do realize you’re not even ten years older than me right?”

“You wish, kiddo!”

“Whatever you say, old man!”

The kid opened the folder, and grimaced at the contents.

“John Volante? What kind of a crap name is that?”

“My thoughts exactly, Jimbo, but alas, I do not make the rules. Or the fake names, evidently.”

Closing the file, the newly named John Volante nodded solemnly.

_Drama queen_ , Clint thought to himself. _What is this guy, 14?_

“I’m in.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope y'all liked this chapter, i'm a little worried that the characterization is off here but my friend swears it's fine so if it sucks it's all her fault ok  
> next chapter will probably be dick's (or rather john's) pov again but i'm not making any promises hhe  
> also not sure if any of you picked this up but volante aka dick's new surname is a play on the latin volare which means to fly  
> as in flying graysons, geddit?  
> ha i'm so great  
> anyway, feedback in any form would be greatly appreciated!!


End file.
